"Bernard Gregoire" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>To which I replied: "Friday audiences have been largely made up of damn
>philistines.  The exceptions, of course, sat in your seat and beside you.
>Not to damn the Friday crowd altogether, I have discovered that at least 10
>percent of the Thursday 10 (series) subscribers stay away from a program
>with anything composed after 1900."

Presumably this is why many programmes prefer to mix 20th Century music
with popular classics - a recent example being Simon Rattle's combination
of Beethoven's 5th Symphony (I think) with the suite from Berg's "Lulu". I
imagine this is good for the box office, as the popular item lures people
in, but is it good for the music?

Would you prefer to visit a concert where the music was of one particular
style in order that it is effectively guaranteed that the audience want to
hear the music and do not shuffle restlessly, or one that mixed the two in
the hope that people would be surprised by how good some more "difficult"
music is?

Sam Kemp